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People who spend too much time playing video games can now be diagnosed with “gaming disorder,” according to a recent announcement by the World Health Organization, but local psychiatrists and researchers aren’t so sure about the controversial move.

“I think the problem is that basically, the people doing the classification don’t really understand the phenomenon well enough to know how to classify it,” said Mikael Jakobsson, research scientist for the MIT Game Lab. “It’s new, it’s dependent on technology that hasn’t been around for very long. They’re trying to cram it into a spot where it doesn’t belong, and it’s actually very problematic.”

The WHO last week added gaming disorder under “disorders due to addictive behaviors” in the final draft of the 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases. The last change to the ICD occurred in the early 1990s.

The disorder is characterized by “1) impaired control over gaming. ... 2) increasing priority given to gaming to the extent that gaming takes precedence over other life interests and daily activities; and 3) continuation or escalation of gaming despite the occurrence of negative consequences,” according to the WHO.

But even the American Psychiatric Association calls it “a condition for further study” rather than an established disorder.

“I think it’s perhaps a little premature,” said Dr. Ash Nadkarni, associate psychiatrist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “Not enough studies have been conducted, and those conducted have only been on small populations.”

Nadkarni said the classification puts people at risk for overdiagnoses, and could keep doctors from getting to the bottom of issues that may be underlying excessive gaming, like depression.

On the other hand, there have been cases of death linked to extreme gaming. A 35-year-old Virginia Beach man died last year after spending 24 hours playing the World of Tanks video game. In 2015, a man died in a Shanghai internet cafe after playing World of Warcraft for 19 hours.

The WHO jumped the gun, according to Dr. Gene Beresin, executive director of The Clay Center for Young Healthy Minds at Massachusetts General Hospital — but he added that psychiatrists should be aware of their patients’ technology use.

“Right now I think the answer is it can be a disorder, but there needs to be more research,” Beresin said. “As clinicians, if we see these folks in our practice, we need to do something about it.”